


A Friend In Need

by UmbraeCalamitas



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Aliens, Angst, Bones is a Hypospray Ninja, Bones is a little trigger-happy, Community: jim_and_bones, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Hurt Jim, Hurt/Comfort, Illness, Injury, Language, Medical Procedures, Minor Character Death, Original Alien Species - Freeform, Original Character Death(s), Original Character(s), Sickness, Star Trek 2009 - Freeform, Triggers, Zombies, h/c, overuse of hyposprays
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-09-25
Updated: 2014-10-19
Packaged: 2017-12-27 13:57:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/979740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UmbraeCalamitas/pseuds/UmbraeCalamitas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim and Bones didn't become friends right away. In fact, Leonard McCoy didn't even like James T. Kirk. Here are five times Jim ended up in the hospital, one time Bones did, and how their friendship evolved over time.</p>
<p>Chapter One: The first time Bones treats Jim at the hospital, the kid's been beaten up in a bar fight, and by the time they're finished, Bones hopes he never sees the blonde again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Strangers

One

**Strangers**

_"Fear makes strangers of people who would be friends."_

~ Shirley MacLaine

* * *

 

"Er, Doctor McCoy?"

Leonard McCoy paused in his movement toward the door, sighing down at the coat he had draped over his arm. He'd just gotten off a fourteen hour shift and was more than ready to go back to his dormitory and render himself unconscious by burying his head deep enough into his pillows to suffocate.

Why was he surprised again that he had been stopped from leaving? It's not like it was an uncommon occurrence. Over the years, Leonard had come to learn one thing above all others: those that were loyal to their jobs got butt-fucked by those who weren't. Leonard may be crass, callous, and biting when ripping a patient a new ass about whatever foolish endeavors got them injured, but he truly did care about the health of those in his care. That loyalty, combined with the fact that he was one of the best surgeons of his generation (and possibly a few generations before him), meant that his coworkers generously took time out of their not-so-busy schedules to screw him over whenever possible. So it really wasn't the possibility of someone needing his help after he'd been ready to leave that bothered Leonard, but rather, that there were certainly other doctors still on duty that could come to the aid of whoever had just been brought in, but who simply didn't care enough to take the initiative.

"Jackson," Leonard McCoy said by way of acknowledgment, turning to the younger man with a stern expression his colleagues and fellow students had come to recognize as the norm for him.

"Um… the, campus security just brought in a patient. I asked Doctor Redne, but he said he has a patient waiting in the OR, sir, and, well… could you?"

Leonard only considered snapping at Jackson for a moment, before deciding against it. The younger man was terrified enough of Leonard as it was, he hardly needed further reason to want to flee his presence. Although the man was younger than Leonard by a good five years, he'd actually already been at the academy for a year and a half. Also in the medical field, the tall but slight man wasn't a doctor by any means, yet. There were a number of orderlies working at the academy's medical facility, but if Leonard was hard-pressed to be honest, Jackson was his favorite. Although the young man was visibly terrified of him (Leonard was fairly certain the only person who scared Jackson more was Admiral Archer), Leonard had had a number of opportunities to see Jackson's potential for being a good doctor.

Unlike McCoy, the young man was not crass with patients; his tone was soft rather than the gruff snarl that McCoy often employed. Leonard was tactile with his patients only when he able to hide the gentle touch of a hand on an arm or brow behind harsh words spoken like a curse. Jackson had no such reservations and was open in his gentleness – something that was often a great help when dealing with children who came in needing care. The young orderly's potential also hid behind a clumsy exterior. Leonard and Redne and other students who had previously graduated with medical degrees had found their places in the world already and knew who they were and how good they were – they were confident in their abilities because they had to be, and because they had experience behind them. This led to a professional air that other people could feel and which some put faith in.

Jackson was young, the abilities he would one day have confidence in were still being honed, and he didn't have that professional, too often arrogant, air. His lanky frame, curly black hair, freckled face and large, round glasses gave him a youthful appearance that some found endearing but few put trust in. But Leonard, who had seen orderlies and assistants come and go back in Georgia, could see the person – the doctor – that Jackson had the potential to become, and he liked him.

And truthfully, Leonard wasn't mad at Jackson for stopping him. He was angry at Redne, because he knew there were no patients waiting for him in the Operating Room. No, Leonard had a pretty good idea that the only thing waiting for the large, red-faced man was Nurse O'Shal.

Scoffing internally, Leonard gave Jackson an encouraging nod and motioned him back toward the middle of the hospital. "Where did you leave my patient, Jackson?"

He ignored the hesitancy of the young man's shoulders to relax, as he was swiftly led back through hospital corridors. "Um, r-room 102, Doctor." He looked like he would have been fidgeting, were they not walking briskly. "He was… throwing a bit of a tantrum about being in a hospital, sir."

Leonard raised an eyebrow at the orderly's back. "A tantrum? How old is this kid?"

"He's a student here, sir. And maybe tantrum is not the right word. He was being rather-"

"You fuckin' hunk of recycled garbage cans! Your damn arms are made of reject car parts, you son of a bitch metal-headed junkheap!"

"-crass," Jackson finished, unnecessarily.

"Ya don't say?" Leonard didn't have to be led any longer, as he was fully capable of hearing which room the kid's voice was screaming from. "He certainly doesn't sound like he needs medical attention."

"Looks like he needs it," Jackson muttered under his breath, though Leonard caught the words. He tilted his head lightly, but didn't acknowledge the younger man's opinion, letting him keep his mutterings, to his knowledge, private. Besides, he had just walked to the door of room 102 and caught sight of the young man within.

And Jackson was right, but forget about a doctor; the damn kid looked like he'd need plastic surgery.

"I'm  _fine_!"

"Yeah, and I'm a rocket scientist." He ignored the kid's wince and yelp as he injected a hypospray into his neck. "Is there a part of your body you're not bleeding from?"

"My eyeballs."

_Cheeky brat._ "That's 'cause they're too damn swollen, ya dumbass. Ya pick a fight with a brick wall?"

"Well, in the intelligence department, that'd about match up." The boy grinned up at him like he'd just been named president.

"Considering how healthy ya look, I'd say the other guy might have a few brain cells on ya." He glared at the kid –  _why_  did he look so damn familiar? – when he reached out and grabbed Leonard's wrist to keep him from injecting another hypospray.

"I don't need any painkillers. I told you,  _I'm fine_."

"It's not a painkiller, ya dumb fuck. It's a sedative."

"A sedative?" The boy pulled bodily away from him, while still holding onto his wrist to keep the hypospray away from his neck. "Wha'd'ya need a sedative for?" He was watching the hypospray like it was a snake about to strike.

"Only way I can think of to shut ya up." Leonard jerked his hand out of the kid's grasp and tried to go in again with it.

Predictably, the boy lunged for his hand and caught his wrist in a tight grasp with both hands. "Ha!"

The hiss of a hypospray ejecting was joined by a yelp. The kid jerked away from the hypospray Leonard jabbed into his neck from where he had hidden it in his left hand. The kid glared accusingly at him, but he just glared right back.

"I don't feel tired." He said it like it was his ticket to revenge against the evil doctor. Leonard resisted rolling his eyes.

"That would be because it was a painkiller. Idiot."

"You said it was a sedative!"

Bones glanced back at the outraged expression on the blonde boy's face and gave him a patronizing glance. "I lied." He grabbed a towel from a table near the back wall and threw it at the kid. "Wash the blood off your face, dumbass. Ya look like ya killed someone."

He saw the kid stick his tongue out at him from the corner of his eye, but ignored it. He was writing the medical report down while the blonde kid went to the sink and ran some water over the towel to wipe his face off with. Leonard was happy to ignore him for the moment, but apparently, the kid had different ideas.

"You know, this is the first time you've doctored me up here."

Leonard rolled his eyes at the conversational tone. "This is a hospital, kid, not a night club. Ya don't go trying to get with every doctor, and leave the nurses alone, ya here?"

"Yeah, because the other doctors totally  _don't_  have their hands all over them."

Leonard's hands hesitated and he resisted the urge to chuckle. The kid was observant, he'd give him that. Leonard had heard the thud against the wall of the room, too, while he'd been taking the younger man's blood pressure. Most would have attributed it to something falling over, or a gurney being pushed into the wall.

Hiding his grin behind a continued scowl, Leonard finished writing down the name of the painkillers he had injected the kid with. Simple over-the-counter drugs. For all his bitching, the kid was right. He really  _hadn't_  needed a hospital. After the barfight, though (which the younger man had told him about in great detail – Leonard rolled his eyes at the memory), the robotic security guards that had pulled them apart had followed their programming and delivered the injured man to the hospital for treatment. Apparently, the kid's opponent hadn't been scathed. Lucky bastard.

Giving the report a final glance over, hesitating on the name for just a moment, Leonard shut the PADD down and tossed it onto the table before turning back to his patient. He was somewhat surprised to find that the younger man was regarding him with a contemplative look.

"What?" he asked gruffly.

"You don't know who I am, do you?"

Leonard rolled his eyes. Trust a war hero's spawn to feel insulted when his ego wasn't stroked. "James Tiberius Kirk. Now get off my table."

Was the kid  _pouting_? "You really don't remember me?"

Puppy dog eyes. What kind of person tried to use that technique past puberty? "Nice try. That doesn't work on me."

"Aah." The mask of misery faded instantly, replaced by a grin that was far too friendly for Leonard's taste. What was this kid's problem? He think everybody was gonna be his pal because of his name? "Ex-wife take the kid, too, Bones?"

_Bones._

Leonard was surprised he hadn't remembered. Actually, no, that wasn't entirely true. He understood perfectly why he wouldn't recall the young man's face. He'd been too worried at the time about not puking in front of a bunch of cadets and seasoned officers. He remembered that ridiculous nickname the dumb kid had pegged him with, and why. Goddamn idiot.

" _All I got left is my bones."_

And that comment he'd just made about Joanna. How much of a callous bastard could a person be? Even Leonard, in his most irate doctor mood, didn't slap someone's ego that close to home.

"Ya don't look much better than ya did that first time, jackass." Leonard was fully aware of how hard it was to decipher his words then they spilled out that accented, but he couldn't help the snarl that curled his lips. Thanks to this damn kid, his night had been ruined by the reminder of how far away he was from his little girl.

Leonard jerked a thumb at the door. "Out, dickhead."

Jim, not James, blinked at him with a look of innocent confusion on his face that Leonard  _almost_  believed. "Wha'sa matter, Bones?"

"It's  _Doctor McCoy_ , Cadet. Now git out of my hospital. I need to sanitize the room so no one catches your damn  _assholery_."

Still holding onto that confused mask, the younger man jumped off the table and made his way to the door, turning around in the threshold.

"Hey, maybe next time I drop by, I'll ask for you." Leonard didn't bother turning around. He could hear the grin spreading across the kid's face – a smile like they were best buds, when they were anything  _but_.

"Ain't a night club, jackass. Git out."

"Right, see you later,  _Bones_."

Leonard whipped around to give the kid a patented death-glare, but the sound of running feet revealed the fast departure before his eyes realized that the threshold was empty. Turning back to wiping off the table with a snarl, Leonard figured that after all the patients thrust onto him, he could get his way with just this one. Redne could take care of Jim Kirk if the dumb fuck ever came in again. He didn't want anything to do with the kid; in fact, he didn't even want to know him.


	2. Acquaintances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leonard McCoy gave the job of caring for a hospitalized Jim Kirk to another doctor. This proves a mistake when the doctor makes an error that sends his patient into Anaphylactic convulsions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the record, I've spent the last fifteen minutes attempting to left-align the text in this chapter. I'm damn close to murdering someone, so you can just deal with centered text. I fucking hate it when shit doesn't work right.

Two

**Acquaintances**

 

"An acquaintance that begins with a compliment is sure to develop into a real friendship." 

~ Oscar Wilde

* * *

 

* * *

 

"Ouch! What the hell?"

Leonard McCoy was well aware that Jim Kirk was currently in the hospital. He was, in fact, just a few rooms down the hall, under the care of Doctor Redne. The good doctor also didn't seem to be too happy about it, and that suited Leonard just fine.

After Leonard had fixed Jim up after his bar fight and been victim to his cutting remarks, the doctor had interrupted Redne and O'Shal during their… activities in the Operating Room. He had made it quite clear to the other doctor that he was willing to deal with his lackadaisical attitudes toward work only to a degree, and while he wasn't about to go running to the nearest Admiral and tattle, Redne could be assured of his complacency by doing one small thing for him. That small thing happened to be blonde, blue-eyed, and fucking rude as hell.

So right now, Doctor Redne was in the clinic room with one James T. Kirk, and Leonard was sitting in an office, doing paperwork.

"What is that? He—OW!"

Leonard sighed. Of course, one of the problems with working in a small hospital was that the offices were so close to the patient's rooms, and  _some people_  were very vocal about their dislike of hyposprays.

He waited a moment to hear the kid continue his complaints about how much his neck hurt – to Doctor Redne, thank god – but none were forthcoming. He wondered if the naturally soft-spoken doctor had managed to say something to shut the kid up. That would actually be impressive.

Leonard leaned back in the chair and studied the next file on his PADD. He was going over all of patients he had taken care of in the past three months and dividing them into groups by students, professors, and Admirals. There was a fourth group consisting of those who were currently serving on a starship, but had come to the clinic while docked. In his sixth months of working at the clinic, he had yet to have such a patient. It made sense, since they would have their on-board CMO to care for them, but he had been told when he started that every three months he would have to go over his paperwork and separate them into four groups for filing, so it was a possibility, if a very rare one.

Leonard was down to the last month and a half of patients, though he knew he wasn't going to have enough time to finish all of these before his shift was over for the day. The file that he currently had open on his PADD was one of the largest that he had seen yet – the larger ones tended to be experienced officers or Admirals who had served as part of the main crew of a starship, thereby placing them in a great deal more danger and ultimately giving them more marks on their medical files. However, Leonard knew that he hadn't had any officers as patients until about two weeks ago in this three month time frame. That was occasionally a blessing, considering that many of the officers tended to be difficult. Leonard didn't care how many stripes they had on their sleeves, and he let them know that, too.

Reading the name on the heading of the file, Leonard frowned.  _James T. Kirk?_ Of course, he remembered making a mark on the kid's file when he had come in before, but Leonard had not read the file completely. If he took the time to do that every time he had a patient, no one would ever get any care. He looked at what the patients primarily used in certain situations – Kirk, for instance, had an over the counter pain reliever listed as being his primary medication for when he was mildly injured. Using that (a type of medication that they had in copious amounts for all of the idiots who came in with headaches, trying to find a suitable excuse to skip an exam), Leonard hadn't needed to read the rest of the file.

Of course, part of the reason that the three month filing took him so long was that he took the time  _to_  read all of the files. It allowed him to ascertain that he made the proper notes when he performed his own care, understand a bit more about the patient if he were to see them again (not that that would be necessary in Kirk's case), and, admittedly, allowed him to farm out the process a little longer and give Redne and the other doctors some time to actually do their job. It wasn't exactly  _fair_ , but Leonard thought he was due for a paperwork-induced break. It wasn't as if he was doing nothing, and of course, he would stop if someone truly needed his help. Redne and the other doctors were his seniors, however, at the clinic, and it would do them well not to rust their talents.

Leonard snorted at the thought of their "talents" and turned back to the file. It was actually larger than some of the files he had of seasoned captains he had taken care of. That was… disconcerting.

Touching the screen of the PADD, Leonard opened the file and perused the information of James T. Kirk's identity.

_Tiberius? God, Kirk, you're lucky they didn't make that your_ first _name. Of course, it might have done some wonders for your ego if they had…_

_Twenty-three years old today? I wouldn't have guessed. You act twelve, maybe younger. I keep waiting to hear you come off with a potty-joke. I think Joanna might actually be more mature than you, and she's six._

Leonard stopped reading for a second, blinking away the burning sensation behind his eyes. Joanna's seventh birthday would be here in a few weeks. Jocelyn wouldn't let him see his baby girl, even just over the vidscreen, to tell her happy birthday. At this rate, his little girl wouldn't even remember him in a few years.

"Goddammit, man. Pull yourself together."  _Brave words, Len, you soft bastard._

He turned his attention back to the file.

_Why don't you have a next of kin listed?_ Leonard tapped the blank space and the PADD automatically took him to the line where his Medical Proxy would be listed.  _Captain Christopher Pike._ Leonard remembered having the captain in for a physical during his second month working at the clinic. He liked the man; he had a good sense of humor but had a no-nonsense type of attitude. Leonard wondered how he knew Kirk. From what he could recall, Pike taught Advanced Tactics, a class generally taken by cadets in their late second or third years. Well, Kirk's father  _was_  the late George Kirk. It was possible Pike had known Kirk's father and made it a point to know his son. It wasn't any of Leonard's business, and he didn't care anyway.

It was just odd. Leonard knew that Winona Kirk was still alive. He had read some of her work recently on the possible medical uses of pollen from a carnivorous plant that could be found on… a distant planet he couldn't remember the name of.

_Why do you care, Leonard? The kid's an ass._ Punching a button to take him back to the main page, Leonard perused the file's massive medical list.  _God, kid, what bone_ haven't _you broken?_ That was disconcerting. Young boys were often active and thoroughly talented at injuring themselves, but to have broken your left arm three different times? Shatter all the bones in your right hand? Broken collar-bone and left leg in the same medical visit. Head injury that induced temporary amnesia. Broken nose, fractured Zygomatic bone. Six broken ribs, eight broken ribs, two broken ribs…

Leonard stopped reading and pinched the bridge of his nose. He remembered the way the kid had showed up on the shuttle six months prior. He'd looked like death warmed over, blood still staining his face and his clothes rumpled and torn. How often did he do that to himself?

Deciding to come back to the large, ongoing list of injuries later, Leonard skipped to the next section of the file.

_Allergies… you have as many allergies as you do previous hospital visits…_

Leonard shook his head as he ran his eye down the mounting list. God… this had to be a joke. It couldn't actually be possible for someone to be allergic to this many medications and still be alive.

Benzocaine? Risocaine?  _Butanol?_ _What do you eat? Butanol's in everything._ All right, so that was an exaggeration, but as a naturally-occurring chemical composition, it was in a great many foods, not to mention medications, perfumes, paints… the list went on.

_Oh, there's the list of foods you can't eat. Chocolate? Your life must suck._ That was one of Leonard's personal weaknesses. If some of his patients learned that little tidbit, he'd never hear the end of it, considering how much he ragged on a lot of them for their diets. Not that he was a glutton anywhere near as much as some of the people he cared for.

Shaking his head, Leonard ran his eyes down the list quickly. Foods he couldn't eat, medications he couldn't take, plants he didn't dare touch, the ones he couldn't be within three feet of…  _Has an adverse reaction to the chemical produced by Reman skin pores? What the—_

The sound of an alarm going off pulled Leonard abruptly from his ruminations. Recognizing the sharp blaring as being the bio-bed alarms in the patient rooms, Leonard dropped the PADD on his desk and hurried from the office and down the hall. The blaring of the alarm became unnecessary once he'd left his office and the walls that had vaguely muffled the sounds of patients no longer prohibited his hearing. Leonard's quick stride became a run at the stuttered cry he could hear someone emitting from one of the patient rooms.

Leonard staggered to a halt in the doorway of the room in question, startled into inaction for only a moment. Doctor Redne stood beside a bio-bed, eyes wide and looking completely lost as to what to do. On the bed, Jim Kirk's hands were folded up by his chest, fingers curled like gnarled claws. His lids had stretched wide but his eyes had rolled into the back of his head until only the whites were displayed, and his mouth was open as white foam frothed at his lips. He was jerking and bucking on the table in a violent seizure, and Redne  _wasn't doing anything_.

"What happened?" Leonard snapped, his voice crisp as he jerked into action, moving quickly into the room and right to the bio-bed. Jim was making a staccato shrieking sound – an attempt at screaming that Leonard had heard from more than one seizure victim that was being thwarted by the foam dribbling from his mouth.

Slamming his hand down on a button on the underside of the table, a thick metal slab the length of the table slid out on the opposite side of the table, doubling the width of the bio-bed. Grasping Jim's right shoulder and ignoring how the muscles bunched and relaxed violently beneath his fingers, Leonard rolled the kid onto his left side with some difficulty.

"What  _happened_?" Leonard snapped, angry at having to repeat himself.

Redne started, and then began babbling. "I don't know. He was doing fine, just whining about the hyposprays like he does and complaining about being at the hospital. He needed a bone setter on his leg and I gave him a shot of Benzocaine while I went to go get it, and then he started complaining about not feeling right and whining about getting another hypospray—"

Redne kept talking but Leonard had stopped listening. Benzocaine. Hard to forget that he had just read that name in Kirk's file, listed under medications he was allergic to. Leonard didn't even waste time asking Redne if he had bothered to read the kid's file. It was obvious he hadn't.

"Get me a shot of Epinephrine," Leonard said sharply, not looking at Redne as he moved over to the other side of the bed so he faced Kirk, one hand still on his right shoulder to keep him balanced on his left side. The kid's mouth had gone slack, foam trickling from the side of his mouth and onto the table. He was still seizing, though far less violently than before, his limbs now merely quivering.

Leonard pressed open one of the kid's eyelids, as both had closed at some point. The whites of the eyes were still wholly visible, but were interspersed with red where blood vessels had ruptured. Grimacing, Leonard tilted the kid's head back to further open his airway, and pressed his chin down to open his mouth wider. The kid gurgled loudly and foam frothed from his mouth, spitting across the table. Leonard reached a hand into Kirk's mouth, swiping out the foam quickly, as Redne came to his side with a hypospray in hand.

Leonard took the mechanism from him without a word and quickly injected the kid with it. The Epinephrine would counter-act the effects of the allergy to Benzocaine, though he wished they had something that would flush his system quickly. He kept his one hand on Kirk's chest, feeling the shuddering of his body as his lungs struggled for air. 

"Get me the bottle of Benadryl out of my desk," he said sharply, his back to the doctor. He tossed the empty syringe onto a nearby table and circled the boy's wrist with his hand, measuring his pulse. 

"Benadryl?" Redne muttered something unintelligible, likely some derogatory comment. Leonard was vaguely aware of the doctor moving closer, as he always did when arguing a point in which he thought that he was right. "That's for infants—"

"Now!" Leonard snapped, turning his head enough to glare at Redne. The doctor's mouth closed quietly and he swallowed, before nodding and and quickly disappearing from the room. Leonard didn't spare Redne a glare, turning his full attention back to his patient.

He felt Kirk's muscles relax under his hand, his pulse slowing to a normal pace as he finally stopped seizing. With a quiet sigh of relief, he gently rolled the kid over onto his back, lowering the boy's arms to his sides but keeping one wrist in his grasp, feeling the pulse beneath his fingers.

"McCoy."

"Here," Leonard said, not even looking at Redne as he held out his free hand. The other doctor placed the bottle of Benadryl (a medication most referred to as obsolete) in his hand. "Now leave, ya damned idiot," Leonard said, his accent thickening now that the danger seemed to be over.

"Idiot? I'll have you know—"

"Benzocaine is listed on Kirk's file as being one of his more potent medical allergens, ya dumb fuck. I don't want t' see ya anywhere near 'im 'til ya can learn t' read!"

He promptly shut the other doctor out, barely registering the man's grumbling as he opened the bottle of Benadryl. He would have preferred to inject the kid with Diphenhydramine intravaneously, but a change in medical procedures a few decades prior had deemed the drug obsolete. Leonard had more than one argument against that idiotic opinion. He'd made certain to stock up on Benadryl, which was still available in some places - usually the more impoverished countries - because he had run afoul of more than one severe allergic reaction in his time as a doctor and Diphenhydramine in any form was good to have on hand, just in case Adrenaline wasn't available. Not that such a thing was likely so long as he had any sort of control. Joanna was allergic to shellfish. Leonard had learned long ago to be prepared. 

Looking down at his patient, Leonard swore loudly at himself as he took in the state of the kid. Definitely an improvement to when he had first arrived in the room, but it could have been better. It could have been  _avoided_.

He was a selfish, damnable fool.

* * *

Jim Kirk opened heavy eyelids with much difficulty and a loud groan. He clenched his hands into fists as he considered breaking whatever light was shining right in his eyes. A moment later, however, it dimmed considerably, and he made an appreciative noise in the back of his throat.

"Wha'ppen?" he slurred, his tongue thick in his mouth.

"Hey, shit-for-brains." Something poked him hard in the side and Jim groaned a protest. "Open ya eyes, jackass."

Opening his eyes enough to squint at a tall, pale and brown blur, Jim was able to make out the vague outline of another human being. Considering that he knew only one person who spoke with that particular accent, however, he decided to take a guess. "Bones?"

"It's Doctor McCoy, ya dumb shit." Something circular was pressed into his hand. "Drink this."

When Jim nearly dropped the cup, the muscles in his hands too weak to keep a grip on it, he heard Bones sigh. The cup was pulled out of his lax grip, before he felt the cool ceramic pressed against his lips. He startled at the sensation, jerking away lightly, but a hand on his shoulder grounded him and the cup pressed against his lips again.

"Don't smell it," the doctor warned. "Just drink it down quickly."

"Is it gonna taste gro—"

Bones tilted the cup up, though, in the middle of Jim's talking, and he gagged as the thick liquid hit the back of his throat, and then choked when his brain finally caught up to the fact that the taste of his tongue was  _vile_.

He tried to spit out the infernal poison – Bones  _must_  be poisoning him, there was no other explanation for how revolting this tasted – but the good doctor merely tipped the cup back further, forcing Jim's head back.

"Swallow," he commanded.

Jim gagged and tried to say no (or, really "no way in hell"), but then fingers were at his neck, massaging his throat, and Jim swallowed out of reflex. And  _then_  he gagged like someone had just fed him skunk spray.

"Oh hell, what is that shit? Can't you just kill me quickly?"

"Shut up," Bones snapped. "Ya sound like a damned infant." Jim was certain he heard something like an ironic chuckle then, but as his eyes were squeezed shut tight and he was trying to curl into himself, he couldn't be sure.

"Here." Another object was placed in his hands and this time Jim forced his eyes open to look at it. A glass filled with a strange, clear liquid was clenched in his fingers. He sniffed it experimentally.

"For Christ's sake— it's  _water_ , you jackass. Just  _drink it_ , already."

Gracing the doctor with a glare, Jim quickly chugged the water down, trying to wash away the taste of the shit he had drank before. It failed, of course. He had a feeling he would taste the other liquid for the rest of his life.

"Are your sadistic tendencies satisfied now?" Jim asked, glaring at Bones as the doctor took back the empty glass. "Have you filled your quota for the day? What was that shit you gave me?"

"Deer piss," Bones said sharply, turning away from him.

Jim gagged again. "Why would that not surprise me?"

"It was Benadryl," Bones said, placing the glass on a counter and turning back around, expression schooled into a snarl. "You had a seizure, ya stupid fuck. Why didn' ya tell Redne ya were allergic t' most painkillers?"

"Aren't you guys supposed to know that stuff?" Jim asked, and his expression was confused and innocently curious. "It  _is_  in my file."

"Gah!" Bones threw his arms up, before turning around and huffing as he left the room. "Git out o' my hospital!" he snarled, before disappearing out the door. He was less annoyed at Jim than he was at Redne and the fact that the information that could have kept this all from happening  _was_  in Jim's file, which Redne  _should_  have read.

More than that, though, he was angry with himself. His selfishness at not wanting to deal with Kirk had left him to stick the kid with Redne, who was clearly far more of a fool than Leonard had ever realized.

"Doctor McCoy?" Jackson stepped up to him, peering curiously over his shoulder at the room he had just left. 

Leonard turned around and rolled his eyes. Obediently (yeah, right), Jim Kirk was slipping on his shoes in preparation for leaving the hospital. Leonard turned to Jackson.

"He needs to stay another day for observation." He shouldn't have told the kid to get out. Nobody who had that severe of an allergic reaction left just after regaining consciousness. Leonard didn't care if nine out of ten doctors _did_ believe Epi-pens solved everything. He was the tenth doctor. What he said went, at least here. "Think you can corral him? Or do you want some help?"

Jackson looked back at the boy in the room, Leonard following his gaze. "No, I think I can handle him," the younger man murmured, which was true enough. Kirk looked about strong enough that a good breeze would blow him over. He was doing a good job of trying to hide it, but Leonard was well-versed in seeing the injuries people tried to hide behind bravado. The kid wouldn't be able to make it to the door. 

Jackson stepped away, headed toward the room. "Tie him down if you have to," Leonard murmured, only half-jokingly. 

He huffed a sigh. Kirk was clearly a moron, thinking he could leave just like that. A moron or a severe optimist.

He would have to take care of the kid when he came to the hospital (and despite his wishes, or because he wished them, Leonard knew the damn fool would be back), otherwise one of the other doctors just might end up killing him. It didn't mean Leonard liked the kid – he just didn't want to be responsible for his death.

He distinctly ignored a voice in his head that said otherwise when, after telling Redne it would be his job to clean up the room Kirk had been using once the boy was officially released from care, he shut himself up in his office and picked up Jim Kirk's file to read over. He just needed to know everything the kid was allergic to for when he came back, just in case. It wasn't like he cared – he didn't.

As Leonard wrote his name in the file as Jim Kirk's primary physician, he scowled at a voice cackling in the back of his head. This didn't mean anything at all.


	3. Classmates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim is dragged to the hospital by his girlfriend, who demands they both get shots for an alien STD.

**Three**

**Classmates**

"My classmates would copulate with anything that moved, but I never saw any reason to limit myself." 

~ Emo Philips

* * *

 

Leonard McCoy had been having a rough day.

Doctor Redne and Nurse O'Shal had been spending most of the day in various supply closets and the operating room, giving each other as much attention as possible. Doctor Redne was a human male, and so Leonard didn't need to do any reading to understand how he would act in such situations. Nurse O'Shal, however, was a Bengalian, a felinian species from a distant world that apparently went absolutely _insane_ when in heat. And he had no doubt whatsoever that she was in heat.

"Remind me again why she's a nurse here?"

"You'd be better asking someone else that question, Jackson. I don't have the faintest idea." Leonard was running the dermal regenerator over Jackson's left arm, which had four long gashes in it, from the claws on Nurse O'Shal's hands. She had apparently taken a great offence when Jackson had gone to Redne to ask a question.

"I just don't understand why she attacked me. I didn't do anything, did I?"

Leonard didn't have the heart to tell the kid that Nurse O'Shal probably thought he was trying to steal away her chosen mate – or whatever she and Redne were to each other. He was fairly sure the approximation would scar the kid for life.

"No, you didn't do anything." Turning the machine off, Leonard ran his fingers gently over the fresh skin, apologizing under his breath when Jackson winced. "If you have a question from now on, you can come and ask me."

"You were busy."

"I'm always busy, Jackson." Taking a small glass container from a drawer by his feet, Leonard uncapped it and scooped out some of the salve inside. He began to smooth the thick, yellowish cream over the new skin on Jackson's arm. Then he slowly wrapped the arm tightly with a bandage. "There. You can take that off tonight, around eight o'clock. The sensitivity should be mostly gone by then."

"Thanks, Doctor McCoy."

Leonard shooed the kid off the biobed he had been sitting on. "Back to work, Jackson."

"Yes, sir."

Leonard watched Jackson leave the room as he washed his hands. That kid really needed to have more confidence in himself. And less nurses attacking him. He would have to talk to someone about O'Shal. There was no way he was confronting her himself. He'd seen the way she'd looked at Jackson, and the way she looked at Redne. He didn't like either. She could look at one of the admirals like that. Maybe Komack. Leonard chuckled.

"Oh no, you are _not_ leaving until we've seen the doctor. James T. Kirk, get your ass back in this hospital right now."

Placing a hand over his face, Leonard grimaced. Well, if that wasn't a fitting introduction. Although, clearly the kid hadn't been dragged in my police bots. That was something, at least.

Putting the salve away, Leonard exited the room and headed out toward the lobby. He walked slowly up to the door, so he could get a good view of what he would be dealing with, before he had to face it. When he stopped in the threshold, however, all he could do for a moment was stare.

Jim was there, all right – he was squirming futilely, trying to escape the hold of what appeared to be a Caitian female, her body covered in a thick layer of black fur. The onyx mane around her neck was standing on end, and her long tail slashed through the air angrily. She, for her part, had an iron grip on his right arm, her long fingers curled tightly around his arm, and Leonard could see that her claws were extended. Joy. She was talking to the receptionist in a voice that whiplashed sporadically between English and the purr-like language of her native race.

The receptionist looked completely lost, and Leonard couldn't blame her. While the language of the Caitians sounded like the pleasant and pleasing purr of a feline, it was quite clear that this one was not happy in the least. Leonard didn't speak Caitian (he was a doctor, not a linguist!), but he'd dealt with a few of them before.

Stepping fully into the lobby, Leonard walked over to the two of them, catching the receptionist's pleading eyes. "Jim," he said by way of greeting.

The kid turned and finally saw him, his face lighting up into a grin. "Bones!"

He barely hesitated, but by the narrowing of the Caitian's eyes, Leonard thought it might have been obvious enough that he had paused for only a moment. It was strange, though, to see someone's face light up like that. Leonard knew Jim hated hospitals. Only having him for two visits before had made that quite clear. He also knew that Jim didn't much care for doctors. In a hospital, though, with he – Leonard – as a doctor, the kid's face still lit up like… like…

_Like Joanna's face would light up when you came home from work. Or called on the vidscreen._

Leonard swallowed thickly and forced his voice to sound normal. "It's Doctor McCoy, kid." He glanced at the Caitian and the curious gleam in her eyes – green cat-like eyes and a likewise curiosity. "What seems to be the problem?"

"We need a vaccine."

" _You_ might need one," Jim said, trying again to remove his arm from her grasp. Leonard thought he saw her tighten her grip.

"What do you need a vaccine for?" Leonard asked, because he was fairly sure that Jim would do just about anything to avoid a hypospray.

"Casanova here—"

"You've never complai—OW!" Jim rubbed his head where she'd swatted him.

"He gave me an STD!" she yelled.

Leonard was rather glad the lobby was empty but for the three of the and the receptionist, who was flushing quite brilliantly. "Right," Leonard said. "Why don't we go somewhere more private, all right? Jim?" He glanced at the Caitian.

"Jezeah."

"Jezeah." He motioned toward the hallway to get the two of them out of the lobby before more people came in and they caused a scene.

He took the two of them to an empty room and closed the door behind him when he entered. "What STD?" he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

"You don't believe me," the Caitian hissed. She began mumbling things in her own language, purring loudly in contempt. Leonard watched, fascination growing, as Jim seemed to gravitate toward her as she spoke in her native tongue. He had never heard anything about Caitians having a hypnotic effect upon the opposite sex, and he wasn't suffering anything of the sort. So… Leonard couldn't help but smirk. It was something distinctly Jim Kirk. Was he attracted to the purring?

Jim's eyelids had lowered until they were nearly closed, and was very nearly leaning against her completely when Leonard shook himself free of his musings. "You clearly know you're infected with an STD," Leonard said, drawing Jezeah out of her mutterings, and freeing Jim from her spell. "You'll save me half the work if you can tell me what one."

"Scabies."

"The hell!" Jim yelled, jumping to his feet. "I didn't give you Scabies! I don't _have_ Scabies!"

"Jim."

"I didn't even have sex with you!"

"Jim."

"Go talk to one of the other guys you've been—"

"Jim!"

Jim stopped and looked at the doctor. "Yeah, Bones?"

"I'm gonna need to do tests on both of ya." He motioned for the door. "Come on."

"But—"

"Come on, Jim."

Reluctantly, Jim followed Leonard out of the room, shutting the door behind him. Leonard walked down the hall until he reached one of the rooms some distance away from Jezeah's room, and let Jim in. Quietly, the kid sat down on the biobed, looking like he was ready to get lectured.

Leonard closed the door and stood in front of it, watching Jim for a moment. "You didn't sleep with her?"

"No," Jim muttered. "Just… kissed a lot. She's pretty, you know, and the purring. I like it when they purr."

"I noticed. You're sure, though? You only kissed. No rubbing or petting—"

"Bones!"

"Scabies aren't passed just through sex, Jim. I need to know."

Jim shook his head. "Just… just kissing."

"All right. Stay here. I'm going to go see if she's right, and then I'll be back. If she got them from someone else, you could still get them from her, okay?"

Jim nodded. "I'll be back soon," Leonard said, and left the room quietly. He wasn't looking forward to the examination he would have to give the Caitian. He'd just seen O'Shal slash up Jackson's arm for asking another doctor a question. He really didn't want the same treatment for touching the Caitian in the wrong place.

_Nothing for it, Doctor McCoy. You're the one who joined Starfleet._

_Damned idiot._

* * *

Jim was still sitting on the biobed, swinging his legs back and forth, when the door whooshed open and Leonard leapt in, shutting it quickly behind him and locking it.

"Bones?"

"Shh." The sound of a loud, scattered purring, which had to be Jezeah, the Caitian, swearing loudly in her native language, swept through the door as the pounding of feet moved past and further down the hall. Leonard visibly sighed in relief.

"What did you do to piss her off?" Jim asked.

Turning around, Leonard leaned heavily against the door. "Oh, the usual. Told her she had the wrong diagnosis, she was pregnant, and then gave her the medication for what she _did_ have." He looked up to see Jim with a shell-shocked expression on his face. _What did—oh._ He bit back a laugh at the wide blue eyes offset by an incredibly pale face.

"Pregnant." Leonard watched a myriad of emotions play over the kid's face, before his body seemed to decide that it was too much to handle.

"Whoa, Jim." Leonard lunged forward and caught the kid before he cracked his head on the floor, fainting. Wrapped one of Jim's arms over his shoulder, he maneuvered him into one of the chairs and then went and grabbed a glass of water while Jim regained himself.

"Pregnant?" Jim asked again when Leonard came back.

"Not yours, of course." He handed over the glass of water, which Jim took and stared into, looking confused. "It's water, infant. Drink it."

Jim took an experimental sip. "I liked it better when you were saying my name." He apparently saw Leonard's confused look. "You've been calling me Jim most of the time today..." He shrugged suddenly, as though it didn't mean anything. "Nevermind." He drained the glass of water. "Right, so, Jezeah's pregnant with some cat's kid. Goodie for her. I'm off."

"Hold on," Leonard said, grabbing the kid by the arm when he'd lunged for the door. "Jezeah didn't have Scabies, no, but she wasn't totally in the clear, and I'm betting neither are you."

"What are you—OW! Fuck, Bones!"

Leonard grinned as he pocketed the hypospray he had just stabbed into the kid's arm. "There. Now you're fine."

"What the hell was that for?" Jim demanded, as Leonard placed the empty glass on the counter and unlocked the door. "What did Jezeah give me?"

"Fleas."

Jim blinked stupidly at him. "Fleas… fleas?"

Leonard walked briskly down the hall, rolling his eyes at Jim's dramatics, as the kid kept pace with him. "Where the hell did she get fleas? I thought they were extinct on Earth."

"She probably brought them from home, _idiot_." Jim pouted, but kept up with him. "You can leave now," Leonard said.

"Not until you call me by my name again."

Leonard cocked an eyebrow at him. "Leave, _infant_."

"I am not an infant!"

"Perhaps you should go and find the other girls you've been hanging around with lately," Leonard said, stepping into his office and turning in the threshold to face Jim. "You may have given them the little gift you got from Jezeah."

He watched as Jim flushed and then paled. "How am I supposed to bring _that_ up?"

Leonard grinned at him. "Goodbye, Jim." He shut the door in Jim's face.

Jim stood staring at the door for a second, before he stepped back and sighed. "Okay, so… how many girls was it, after Jezeah?"

As he turned and left, he tried very hard to ignore the sound of Bones laughing from behind his closed office door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I played the idea of STD up for laughs here, but it should be noted that the reality of such things are no joke. Sexually transmitted diseases are a serious concern and can be deadly. It's best to get yourself and your partner checked for diseased prior to intimacy, for the safety of yourself, your partner, and anyone else you may be intimate with in the future.


	4. Roommates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leonard is on a week's vacation from the clinic while he works on final exams. He gets a call from the clinic telling him that Jim Kirk is in the hospital, and he better come in.

IV

Roommates

"I don't need to pay a therapist to give me crap. I have a roommate that does it for free." 

~ unknown

* * *

Leonard McCoy rubbed his eyes wearily as he stood up from the desk chair. He'd been staring at the screen of his dorm room's computer for three hours and needed a break. Working in the hospital was one thing – Leonard had grown accustomed to that from years of being a surgeon. The thing he had trouble getting used to was being back in school and all of the homework and exams that went with it.

"Damn Finals," he muttered, as he stepped into his small kitchen and punched in a code on his synthesizer. A few seconds later, a window rolled up on the machine, displaying a steaming cup of coffee, which Leonard eagerly withdrew. He blew on the hot liquid as he made his way back into the other room, pulling out his chair. Just as he was about to sit down, the comm. link in his room buzzed. Leonard set his coffee cup on the desk, frowning. He had set the comm. to its Do Not Disturb setting, since he was studying for Finals, and very few people would have been able to get through to buzz him. He walked over to the small box on his wall next to the door and hit a button, muttering into the speaker, "McCoy."

" _Dr. McCoy, this is Jackson."_

Leonard groaned. If Redne had called in to say he couldn't work today and Leonard had to go in and do his job for him, it better be because the other doctor was the one on the table. If he found out that Redne had taken off to be with O'Shal, who was on vacation that week, Leonard was going to make sure that Redne needed emergency care.

Pressing the button again, he asked, "What shift needs covered, Jackson?"

" _Um…"_ In the background, Leonard could hear a biobed siren going off. _"No shif—"_

"What's going on?" It hadn't been right of him to assume. In his head, sure; he was entitled to his own thoughts, just like everyone else, but Leonard shouldn't have just jumped to a conclusion with Jackson. The sound of the siren rang in his ears, even when his side of the comm. was activated and he couldn't hear it through the speaker.

" _The med. transport just brought in James Kirk, sir,"_ Jackson said, and he sounded a little worried. Of course, Jackson knew that Leonard was Jim's doctor. The last major fiasco with Nurse O'Shal, when she nearly tore off Jackson's arm for asking Doctor Redne a question, had caused the intern to bond with Leonard. Of course, he had told the kid to come to him if he needed to ask a question, since he really didn't want Jackson to get flayed alive by one of his coworkers just for doing his job, but it had led to Jackson becoming something of a personal assistant to Leonard. Although he was there as an intern to do work, when he went in on the days that Leonard also worked, he went to see him immediately and received all of his duties from the cantankerous doctor. One of the good things about it was that Leonard knew the potential that Jackson had, and he was glad he was able to point the kid in the right direction, rather than relying on the lazy dispositions of the other doctors to force the kid to do all of the work and likely make him into either a quitter or a very bitter man.

Leonard was unfortunately well-acquainted with someone of the latter sort. He tended to avoid the company of mirrors for such a reason.

But Jackson knew from working closely with Leonard that when Jim Kirk was brought in, Leonard was the one that saw to him. After the time that Doctor Redne had nearly killed the young man by giving him a sedative he was deathly allergic to, Leonard made sure that no other doctor saw to his needs. Jackson also knew that Leonard was rather fond of Jim, though he would expressly deny this if it was brought up to him. The kid was an annoyance who had a habit of getting himself into trouble, often the kind that involved robotic policeman and too much alcohol.

"What's the situation?"

If the kid was drunk again… though Jackson sounded worried, and while he was a caring young man with less confidence than Leonard thought healthy, he did not often sound so concerned.

" _They've taken him into surgery, sir. He's… not well."_

Not well. How ambiguous, which was concerning in and of itself.

"Who's working on him? Have they given him anything, yet?"

The hesitation caused Leonard's blood pressure to skyrocket. If Redne was in there—

" _I gave him a sedative, sir. I read through his file some weeks ago, like you suggested I should. I made sure he wasn't allergic to it. No one is working on him, yet, sir, but I'm in his room. I think— please come quickly, sir."_

"I'll be there as soon as I can, Jackson."

Leonard McCoy didn't even shut off the lights in his dorm room. He simply bolted out of his dorm room and down the street, headed for the hospital.

* * *

Jackson had been trying not to get Leonard worked up over the comm. When Leonard arrived, he immediately went into Jim's room, to find the kid battered and bloody on the biobed. He looked like someone ran him over with a speeder.

It actually wasn't all that far from the truth.

"He ran out in front of a car?"

"That's what the med. transport said," Jackson said, following Leonard back into the room where Jim was. "They talked to someone who had been there when it happened. Someone was driving down the street and James just ran out in front of them."

It always intrigued Leonard that Jackson referred to Jim as _James_. He noticed that the kid did that with a lot of patients, though. Those in a higher rank than he, like Leonard, were referred to by their title (Doctor, Missus, Mister, or Admiral and the like), and patients were referred to by their full first names, which wasn't as distant as calling them by their last name, but not informal and on a friendly basis like a nickname would be.

Leonard wondered what Jim would say if he heard Jackson calling him James.

"That doesn't sound like Jim." And it didn't – the Jim that Leonard knew would never run out in front of a car for no reason. Even drunk off his ass, he was more likely to start a fight than to commit near-suicide (though one could argue that starting a brawl with some of Jim's previous opponents was just that). Still, there had to be more to the story.

Leonard sighed as he walked back into the room where Jim was laying. Jackson was a smart kid. After he had spoken to Leonard on the comm., he had set up a stasis field around Jim's abdomen, to freeze the internal bleeding which was what required him to have emergency surgery. That gave Leonard time to go over all of Jim's injuries before he opened him up to deal with the worst problem.

He was in for a long night…

The vehicle that hit Jim had been tearing down the road. Whatever reason the kid had run out in front of it, he was lucky to be alive – damn fucking lucky. When the car struck him, it broke both of his legs and shattered his left kneecap. The entire left side of his body was nothing but one giant bruise, except for the side of his face, which had been nothing but blood and glass fragments when Leonard arrived. His head had been cracked open on the windshield, and Leonard didn't know how he hadn't lost his left eye. He hated to think of the possibility that Jim either wouldn't wake up, or that he would wake up and not be the same person, or not be a person at all, anymore – not really.

Leonard ran a hand down his face and resisted the urge to shudder. "Jackson, I need you to get the dermal regenerator. I want you to work on Jim's head."

"Yes, sir." Jackson left the room quickly to fetch the machine, and Leonard walked up and placed a hand on his patient's head.

"Damnit, Jim."

* * *

The surgery lasted six hours. Jackson spent the time using the dermal and ossein regenerators to seal up Jim's skull and then fix the broken and shattered bones of his legs. The left leg itself had taken three hours, as the young man had needed to use a machine that allowed him to move each shattered bone fragment into the proper place before he could use the ossein regenerator to seal the fragments together and speed up the regeneration process.

Unfortunately, the ossein regenerator was not nearly as effective as the dermal regenerator, and Jim had been heavily injured. He would be out of commission for a few weeks, at least, before he would even be able to think of taking any classes that required physical exertion.

Knowing Jim, getting him to even sit still was going to be a problem.

The surgery actually hadn't been nearly as difficult as Leonard had thought it would be. There had been some severe internal damage from the impact of the vehicle, but once Leonard had managed to find the damaged arteries and pinched them off, fixing them hadn't been a large problem. Leonard had been a surgeon for many years, too, so he was quite accustomed to that type of work. Considering how badly Jim was injured, he was very glad.

"Doctor McCoy?" Leonard looked up from where he had been standing next to Jim's biobed to find Jackson looking at him from the threshold of the room. "Did you need me for anything else, sir?"

"No, Jackson, you can go home. Get some sleep." He glanced back up at the younger man and tried for a smile. It came out more as a grimace, but the intention was there. "And thank you for your help today. I appreciate you calling me."

"Yes, sir." Jackson left the room and Leonard heard his steady footsteps as he walked down the hall. The kid would leave slowly, just in case Leonard changed his mind about needing him – he always did that.

_You're a good kid, Jackson._

Leonard sighed as he looked down at the biobed. Surgery always made patients look so damn pale, and Leonard hated that look on Jim. The kid's face was white, his lips a dull fleshy color. Lying in a bed with sheets too damn white, even for a doctor who had been in the profession for as long as McCoy, the kid looked too damn close to dead for comfort. Leonard rubbed a hand down his face. The surgery hadn't been that hard, no – Leonard had had many other, more difficult jobs to perform – but that didn't mean it hadn't still been close. How Jim hadn't been killed when he was hit by the car, Leonard would never know.

But he did intend to find out what the dumb shit had been thinking when he'd run out in front of a speeding car. He just hoped that when Jim woke up, he was capable of telling him.

Leonard could have gone back to his dorm room and gone to bed, or gotten back to studying for his exams, but the idea of leaving Jim lying alone in the hospital bed bothered him. He didn't know why – the two weren't friends. Jim was just Leonard's patient because none of the other doctors could be trusted to properly care for the boy. That was all.

He pulled a chair over to the side of the bed and sat down in it, running a hand over his face.

Damnit.

* * *

The moment that the pain hit him, the world went from white to gray. That dulled the pain in his head for reasons that he wasn't quite sure of, but he was grateful for it. Groaning, he blinked his burning eyes at the gray world, trying to find something familiar in a place he was sure he knew, but he felt foggy and slow, and couldn't quite comprehend what was going on around him.

What had happened? Hadn't he been at a bar? Yeah, there was a beautiful Caitian bartender working that third bar he'd stopped at. She had made it clear that she wasn't interested in anything sexual, but she'd had a good sense of humor and Jim never passed up a chance to flirt with someone who was perfect at giving it right back to him. It helped, of course, that her laugh was a grumbling purr that made him want to melt into a puddle all over his stool. He'd hung around in the bar, talking to her, for a few hours before he had to leave. She'd been good company and Jim had enjoyed talking to her – of course, no one would believe him if he said he planned to return to that bar to see her again, for nothing more than conversation.

But he needed to get back to the dorms before curfew, so he'd walked outside. And that's when that car had come speeding down the road…

A point of pressure on his shoulder caused Jim's thoughts to dissipate. He blinked, confused, and then looked to his left. There was a hand on his shoulder, pressing against the skin. He followed the arm up to the face of a man with brown hair and green eyes and an oddly worried expression.

"Jim?" the man asked. There was some dark stubble on his face and it looked a little like the man hadn't been sleeping well. The bags under his eyes were pronounced and only served to further enhance his worried expression. Jim blinked when he noticed the man had on scrubs. Ah. He was in a hospital.

Well, fuck.

And this man above him – why was he so worried? Jim was obviously alive or he wouldn't be taking note of the things around him, and his head wouldn't be screaming in pain. Jim tried to take stock of the situation. His head ached, but that was nothing to be overly concerned about – he'd had far worse headaches before. His left side was a little sore and the skin pulled uncomfortably when he tried to move. Jim pulled his legs up so he could swing them over the side of the bed and sit up… except his movements didn't happen. He lifted his leg again, or tried to, but nothing happened, and he felt his breath quicken and something within his chest give an uncomfortable twinge. He couldn't move his legs…

The pressure against his shoulder came again and Jim opened his eyes. Had he fallen asleep?

"Jim. Talk to me, please?"

He looked up at the doctor above him. Why did everything have to be so fuzzy in his brain? He still felt like part of him was back at that bar, talking to Hrar'ith, the pretty brown Caitian bartender.

Of course, he wasn't at the bar anymore. He was in a hospital. He hated hospitals. And he was being touched by a doctor. He hated doctors. Well, not all doctors… wasn't there one…?

The synapses in his brain apparently chose that moment to properly fire. Jim closed his eyes and mentally shook himself, reining in his wild thoughts, which leapt in simultaneous directions toward Hrar'ith and his doctor and his motionless legs and a starship that would never be his and the Kobiyashi Maru test, which he would never even be able to take, because they wouldn't let him stay—

"Jim?" The doctor's voice cut off his wild thoughts and Jim was grateful, because right now, he didn't want to think about it. He didn't want to think about everything he wanted being everything that he couldn't have.

"Bones," he murmured instead, and opened his eyes to see a look of relief pass over the doctor's face. The man was a little paler than normal, with black bags under his eyes and a growing beard on his face. "You need to shave."

Bones laughed then, though it sounded slightly strangled by a note of hysteria that made Jim frown. He turned his head and looked around. There was a privacy curtain pulled up around his bed. That didn't happen very often.

"I should kick your ass for scaring the hell out of me," Bones growled at him. "I thought you were brain dead."

"Sorry to disappoint." Jim flicked his eyes back up to the doctor. "How long have I been here?" Bones' expression dropped back to unpleasant and he looked away. Jim couldn't deal with the silence right now – he needed Bones to talk to him. He needed a distraction, because as long as he had a distraction, he was able to forget the truth. "Bones?"

"Six days, Jim," Bones said, fingers gripping the bed sheets tight. "I was startin' t' wonder if ya were gonna wake up a' all, ya dumb shit."

Jim took the opportunity offered him like a tom cat took a stray in heat. He gave the doctor one of his biggest smiles, baring his teeth in a grin that had set off more than one Admiral. "You know your accent flares up when you're pissed?"

"Goddamnit, Jim!" the doctor yelled, throwing his hands up in the air. "What the hell were ya thinkin', runnin' out in front o' a car?"

At this, Jim's face went red in a deep blush and he looked away quickly.

Surprised by the abrupt and unexpected change, Leonard studied his patient for a moment. "Jim."

"I don't want to talk about it." He seemed to shrink down into the biobed. "It's stupid." _So stupid. So unbelievably fucked up and it'll never stop being stupid and I'll never stop wishing I hadn't cared what had happened—_

"I'm glad you realize that in hindsight, but you're still going to talk about it! So either tell me, or you can tell the campus psychologist."

"Psychologist?" Jim stared at Leonard, aghast. "What the hell, Bones? Why in the fuck would I need to talk to a psychologist?" _Don't say it, don't say it, don't say that it's ruined it's all ruined just let me forget forget forget forget—_

"You ran out in front of a car, you goddamned stupid fuck!"

"Because there was a stroller sitting in the middle of the road!" Jim screamed, spit flying from his mouth at the force of it. He'd had a good reason – _he had_! "I am _not_ suicidal! I haven't been suicidal for years, so you can just—shit." He didn't have to look at Bones' face to know he said too much. He threw his arms up over his face and just begged to disappear.

"Jim…"

"Please just leave me alone," Jim whispered. He would take his wild and pain-filled thoughts about loss and losing everything all over again – he could handle that. It was the memories he couldn't take. He didn't want to talk about convertibles or driving off cliffs or child psychologists who didn't see fist-sized bruises or _Frank_ or wishing wishing wishing for someone to come save him and knowing no one would never come.

There was a long few minutes of silence, and then a soft, weary sigh. A touch against his arm made Jim flinch slightly, and the hand retreated, but Leonard's voice came softly. "There was a stroller?"

Jim considered not answering, but this was a much safer topic. It was a topic where, really, he hadn't done anything wrong. He had just made a mistake in judgment – a bad command decision. His _last_ bad command decision.

He'd been an idiot.

"I came out of the bar and there was a car speeding down the road, and there were so many people, but they jumped out of the way. And then there was a stroller in the middle of the road, but no one was pulling it out of the way, and the car was going to hit it, so I ran out to push it out of the way…"

"And the car hit you instead?"

"Hit the stroller, too," Jim muttered. He lowered his hands, looking dejected and completely embarrassed and so ready to simply give up on _everything_. "I wasn't fast enough to push it out of the way. Stupid."

Leonard swallowed around a thick throat, feeling as though his stomach had just dropped through the floor and was taking everything else with it. "And the baby…" Maybe it wasn't the right question. He should talk to a police officer – one of the people who had covered the scene. He shouldn't be burdening Jim with remembering the incident, especially if, like it seemed already, the kid was determined to blame himself for something that was in no way his fault.

Jim started laughing and Bones reached out to grab his wrist, ready for a movement of panic or hysteria or complete madness, but Jim just laughed until he couldn't breathe and then he wheezed between chuckles, tears leaking from his eyes, as he looked up but seemed to stare past McCoy. "See, that's why it's so stupid. The stroller was empty."

_You have got to be…_

"Someone had just left it in the middle of the road. There wasn't anything in it – not even a blanket. And I ran out in the road and pushed it out of the way for nothing. And I'm stuck in this hospital and I'm never gonna be able to finish Starfleet or become a starship Captain, all for some fucking empty… empty stroller."

The tears were coming faster now and Jim's voice was harder to understand behind his attempts to hide his sobs, and Leonard understood the disgust at having been put in the hospital for thinking something other than was the case, although Jim's intentions had been right and he had made a decision that few would – a foolish, but incredibly brave decision. What Leonard didn't understand was the rest of what his patient was saying.

"Why won't you finish Starfleet?" _Or become a Captain? That doesn't make any sense._

Jim sobbed once, loudly, and the sound hurt Leonard to hear. Worse still was the look that Jim gave Leonard – a plaintive look more sincere than any Leonard had received from the young man before. It was a look that begged Leonard to make something better, even knowing that the request was futile, the action impossible.

"I can't feel my legs."

And, of course, that explained it. Paralyzed from the waist down, Jim wouldn't be able to walk, to finish the classes required for the Command Program, to perform the duties of a Starship Captain. Paralyzed from the waist down, Jim's career, his life's plans and wishes, were over.

Leonard placed a hand upon Jim's head, the gentle touch calling the young man's attention as Leonard leaned down so that his eyes locked with Jim's and he was certain the young man was paying attention. Those blue eyes severed him, but he did not break his gaze.

"When the car hit you, both of your legs were broken." He felt the cadet shuddering underneath his hand but made no mention of it. "Your left knee cap was shattered completely." A few tears leaked from those radioactive-blue eyes, rolling down the young man's cheeks like the retreating tails of sorrow personified. "My assistant used a bone regenerator on your legs to heal them, but the damage was significant. So once he was finished, we placed a stasis field around them to make sure you didn't injure yourself as you slept."

Leonard felt the utter stillness of the young man beneath him, saw the hope and disbelief and fear burning in eyes that would surely glow in the dark, and some part of him hurt for a young man who could fear and hope so deeply that it appeared to tear him in two.

Then Jim lifted his head to look down his body, and his eyes caught sight of the translucent blue stasis field that held his legs in place and he laughed. He laughed until he cried again, this time in relief, and McCoy had to sedate him before he suffocated on the emotion.

* * *

"Your roommate's not gonna hate me for staying with you, is he?" Jim asked, as Leonard pushed the wheelchair down the second floor corridor of his building.

"I don't have a roommate," Leonard said, slapping the back of Jim's hand as the kid tried to reach for the wheels of the chair again. "Stop."

"Why can't I push myself?" Jim whined, looking back at Leonard with a puppy dog expression that he had to know by now didn't work on the doctor.

"Because I am not chasing you down the hill again when you decide to be an idiot and test the aerodynamic capabilities of your wheelchair, you dumb shit."

"Aw, come on, Bones. It was fun."

Leonard didn't even bother correcting the kid on his name. A year into their Starfleet careers and the kid still hadn't given up that ridiculous nickname for it, Leonard was pretty sure any attempts to stop it at this point would be futile.

"You're an idiot, Jim."

"Best you've ever met." He glanced at the door Leonard stopped at, watching as the doctor slid his keycard into the slot and the lock clicked open. "So… no roommate. How did that work?"

"I'm training to be a ship surgeon—"

"Which makes no sense, by the way – you being afraid of space and all."

Leonard ignored him, kicking the door open and wheeling Jim inside. "Because I have to work at the hospital while suffering the same amount of classes as everyone else, a roommate could be a distraction, so I don't have to have one." He kicked the door shut behind him and wheeled Jim over to the bed.

"Oh, hey." Jim glanced around the room and saw that there was only one bed in the dorm. "Um… Bones? I'm not sleeping with you, am I?"

"What's the matter, Jim? I thought you'd like that."

"Yeah… see, you're kind of not my type."

"Oh really?" Bones asked, raising an eyebrow at Jim as he walked past him to pull back the covers on the bed. "And what about me makes me not your type, Jim?"

"You smell like hospital."

Tsking, Leonard shook his head. "You're missing out, Jim. Surgeons are _very_ good with their hands."

"Um…" Leonard grinned at the expression on Jim's face, clearly displaying the fact that the kid had _no idea_ what to do. Leonard clapped him lightly on the shoulder, careful not to cause him harm. "Relax, Jim. I'm teasing." He grabbed the kid's arm and helped him out of the chair. "Come on, in you go."

"I'm not tired, Bones."

"You will be, Jim – trust me."

"You're gonna hypo me again, aren't you."

Leonard laid the kid down and pulled the covers up to his chin, patting his chest lightly. "Of course not. What would give you that idea?"

"You smell like _hospital_." Leonard laughed.

Jim watched as the doctor moved around the dorm room, pulling blankets and a spare pillow out of a closet and moving over to the couch. He frowned.

"Bones, I— I didn't mean to steal your bed from you. This isn't fair to you."

"Relax, kid." Leonard glanced over at the worried young man trying to push himself off of the bed. "And if you roll onto the floor, I really _will_ hypospray you, right in the ass." Jim went very still.

"I offered to let you stay with me so that I can keep an eye on you. I can't stay around the hospital all day long and I don't trust the other doctors not to kill you when I'm not there. This is the easiest solution. You can sleep, and I can study for Finals."

"But, Bones—"

"Shut up, Jim. I've already sent in the proper paperwork and I'm not wasting my time changing it, so just go to sleep."

The couch made up, Leonard walked over to the desk to find his computer in sleep mode and the cup of coffee from a week ago ice cold on his desk. He hadn't been back to the dorm since Jackson called him to come in because Jim had been hit by a car. He took the coffee cup into the kitchen and dumped it out in the sink, returning a few moments with a fresh one and a reluctance to sit down and study for Finals.

Leonard glanced over at Jim to find the young man's eyes were closed and he was dozing. He'd had a good feeling the kid wouldn't last long. Nearly catapulting himself from the wheelchair rolling down that damn hill had taken a lot out of him. Leonard laughed. Had he been in the wheelchair, he might have damn near pissed himself, but once he'd caught up to and stopped Jim, the kid had roared with laughter and whooped loudly, begging for another go.

It had been all Leonard could do to resist slapping the kid across the back of the head.

Seeing the young man asleep on the bed put Leonard at ease and he pulled out his desk chair and sat down, waking his computer up and finding the files he needed.

He was halfway through an incredibly boring and incorrect argument about Benadryl being an obsolete drug when he heard a mumble from the bed. Turning his attention from the article, he looked over at the young man wrapped in blankets.

"What's that, Jim?"

"'zis make us roommates?" the tired man slurred, blue eyes squinted to try and catch sight of the doctor in the room.

"I suppose it does." He watched as the blue eyes slipped closed and his roommate's breathing evened out until it was clear he was fast asleep. Leonard couldn't help but smile softly.

"Goodnight, Jim."


	5. Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's an illness going around Starfleet Academy that has the hospitals full to capacity, as well as the morgue. They're nowhere near close to finding the nature of the sickness, much less a cure, and Leonard is only heading back to his dorm for the first time in four days to get just a little sleep. But of course Jim is there waiting for him, and of course he's sick.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two things, and I'll be quick. The first is this: this chapter is not pretty. It's not cute and fluffy and funny. It's horrible and a little frightening and sad. People die. People I didn't want to die have died in this chapter. Please make a note of this before you read it, in case that sort of thing is a trigger for you. There's a brief scene describing a seizure and some callbacks to previous chapters. Nothing too graphic, but the topic is frightening. There is still friendship, though, and hurt/comfort, and a little humor (not enough to mark that as a genre, imho), and angst, and a slew of other genres I'm not bothering to mention. I hope you like it. Even more than that, I hope you'll review, even if you don't like it, because that does make this whole sharing this worth it.
> 
> The second thing is this: I'm incredibly sorry for taking so long. I did have this chapter written before – quite a bit different and much more light-hearted than this version, but the crash and death of my laptop sent me spiraling into misery and I just gave up working on this for a while out of sheer disgust with my luck. I'm back, though, and while my updates will be slow (I've published three books since I've last updated this and I'm working on my next one at the moment), I am still working on them. I'm hoping to have the next and final chapter of A Friend in Need up within the next month or so. Helps that I know what happens in that one.
> 
> Anyway, I said I would be brief. This is brief for me. I hope you enjoy the chapter. Even if you don't enjoy it, please review. People actually look at the review count before they read something, so that does matter, and it's just nice to hear thoughts sometimes from those you share your work with.
> 
> Thank you all for being so patient with me. Even if you were impatient, thank you. Enjoy the chapter.

* * *

**V**

**Friends**

* * *

" **The friend in my adversity I shall always cherish most. I can better trust those who helped to relieve the gloom of my dark hours than those who are so ready to enjoy with me the sunshine of my prosperity."**

**~ Ulysses S. Grant**

* * *

Leonard gave a visible sigh of relief when his door came into view. He ran a hand down his face to wipe off the sweat he imagined he could still feel there, grateful that he was able to do it himself and didn't require a nurse's hand dabbing at his forehead with a damp cloth. It had been three days since he had been back to his dorm room. Three days of cat naps in his office chair between hourly checks on the numerous patients in the hospital and screening the incoming flow. The hospitals were all full and the on-campus clinic was no less so, but Leonard was dead on his feet and he couldn't get any decent sleep within those walls. Nor was it safe to try.

Twelve hours, the admiral had said. Leonard had twelve hours to sleep and recover before he would be back in the office to try and save what few they could.

He rubbed his face again. He was so _tired._

"Can this unit assist you further, Doctor McCoy?"

Leonard glanced at the security robot walking along beside him and shook his head. "No, ah'm good," he mumbled.

"Negative response noted and catalogued," the secbot answered in its mechanical voice. It turned and walked away without another glance in Leonard's direction, and he wasn't sad to see it go.

He hadn't been ignorant of the robotic side of campus security before this, but their presence had always been toned down considerably. Every now and then you would spot one of the droids performing one of the simpler duties, like checking for parking violators or scolding street-artists who had chosen to grafitti campus property. Duties like guarding a building or person, or keeping guards on a watch rotation, were performed by organics. No one ever came out and said precisely why, but Leonard had his theories. Robots simply didn't have the sixth sense so inherent in living species, regardless of how high their programming had been developed. Nor did they have the level of compassion sometimes (often) needed when dealing with people who might otherwise cause harm, or in situations that required an emotional touch.

Leonard thought back sadly to the incident six months prior when a fire on campus had led to the death of a child because the robot was unable to soothe away her terror in the manner a person might have been able to. It had been a horrible day, made worse by the callousness of some people.

 _And that's the other side of the emotional spectrum,_ Leonard thought sadly, keying in the code to his door.

The security robots were a familiar sight now to everyone on campus. When the sickness first struck, the security force had been hit hard and at least half of the men, women, and indeterminates had been struck down and out of commission. The security robots had been called in to handle the simplistic tasks they usually overtook, but that attempt at splitting forces didn't hold when more and more of the force fell ill. Eventually, the robotic security was the only security and the tasks had been prioritized, leading to a great deal of illegal parking and a higher-than-usual count of graffiti'd walls.

More people began to fall ill, worse than the first wave, and suddenly the hospitals were being filled with people suffering everything from symptoms of the common cold to epileptic seizures. There was no consistency, no connection, and no clear manner in which the apparent illness was being spread. People were just getting sick, and the symptoms kept worsening over time. That first wave of security ended up in the hospital with symptoms as bad as the third wave. It seemed an epidemic of horrid proportions, with people just getting sicker and sicker.

Par'tri Veskus was the first of the sick to die, and with his death, the floodgates seemed to shatter.

Utter panic hit the campus, spread to the surrounding cities. There was talk of quarantines and plagues. People rushed to get away and, in true Earth-fashion, the government rushed in to keep people in one place, causing an even greater panic in the doing.

Leonard, along with the other doctors and nurses on campus, started doing their best to heal people. It didn't work out quite as they had hoped. Whatever they threw at the sickness, it twisted out of the way of all healing attempts and only seemed to worsen. They couldn't define it, couldn't catalogue it, couldn't stop it. It mutated, it worsened, it killed people, and then it brought them back.

He had seen his fair share of zombie movies growing up and playing games like Zombie Apocalypse (a twist on the old earth game Capture the Flag), but nothing had prepared him for this. One moment they're covering up the face of a Ri'xen who had passed and then next he's lunging off the bed attempting to murder the doctors who failed to save him. Pretty soon after that, things on the campus changed.

There were eight security droids in the clinic - two for each doctor and two extra to stand and guard the entrance doors. Robotic security roamed the campus in the stead of the organic security force, and there was a lock-down on campus with a stringent curfew. Classes were cancelled and students were not allowed to leave the campus, expecting back in their dorms before six in the afternoon. Anyone left outside past six, unless having proper security passes like the admirals or having a secbot with them, would be deemed an immediate threat and _detained_. Leonard wasn't sure what exactly that meant and he hoped to never find out.

Scientists, both those outside of Starfleet and those within (graduated and not) were working on a cure. Leonard was hopeful - he was a doctor, he had to be - but things looked bleak on his side of things. The clinic was full of the sick and dying, and there wasn't a very large line to separate the two. The incubation period of the virus or whatever it was had been steadily dwindling down. It seemed they sometimes had a patient for only a few hours and they were passing on. Whatever this sickness was, it was quickly evolving into the perfect killing machine.

And the dead didn't even have the decency to leave the living in peace.

Realizing that standing in the middle of the hallway during curfew with no secbot around was the prince of bad ideas, Leonard keyed the rest of his code in and tried to ignore how loud the swish of his door sounded as it opened.

He stepped into the main area, noting that someone had turned off the lights he usually left on. He figured one of the caretakers had stopped into his room to perserve electricity and didn't think much of it as he fumbled for the light switch. The door slid shut behind him and Leonard swore as he tripped over a hard, heavy object lying just inside the door.

"What the hell," he grumbled, pushing himself to his feet.

There was a stutter of shoes on the hard floor, probably of his bathroom, and Leonard went very still, drawing in a deep, quiet breath and holding it briefly.

The silence rang in his ears like noise, the great vast emptiness of it a sound all its own, but Leonard ignored that and listened.

In the stillness of his dark apartment, he heard it. The sound of someone breathing.

He tried to think of anything he had on his person that might work as a weapon, but he hadn't brought anything back from the hospital. There were normally a few glasses lying on his coffee table, but without the light, he couldn't comfortably see them to fetch one, even if he didn't have to worry about the intruder hearing _his_ movements in the dark. God knew what weapons the intruder might have on his person, and _damnit_ , he was far too tired to deal with this right now. Really, too fucking tired to care.

"Who's there?" he snarled into the darkness.

He heard a gasp of air, stuttered footsteps from a hard floor to cheap carpet, and the sound of something knocking against the wall. A rush of breath released in an exhale, turning at the last second into a whimper, and the shaky inhale that followed.

"Bones," a voice whispered tremulously.

His hand finally found the light switch and he turned it on. His eyes found Jim, cringing from the lights (causing an immediate reaction in Leonard to dim their intensity), leaning heavily against the wall. His face was pale and drenched in sweat, his lips cracked and bleeding, and he was shaking with tremors that seemed to wrack his whole body.

"Oh, Jim," Leonard murmured, immediately recognizing the elevated symptoms of this very, very deadly sickness.

"Bones. I don't feel so good."

* * *

Jim's fever was at 106 - too damn high. His tremors worsened at random moments, backing off to give way to bouts of skin-sensitivity and feeling too hot. Leonard fought his own panic with the calm efficiency of all doctors. He got the shivering Jim out of his clothes ("J-just couldn't w-wait, could… could you, Bones?) and into the hot shower ("Gon-Gonna join me?") He got him dressed ("W-we haven't h-had any fun ye-yet, Bones.)" into a clean set of flannel pajamas Leonard had in his closet - a gift from Leonard's sister a couple Christmases previous - and into the bed. Jim's teasing words had eventually gone quiet - something that secretly frightened Leonard - and the boy had followed the directions given him silently, regarding Leonard with large, trusting eyes that held none of the contempt they probably should. There was nothing that the doctor could do to help him, and Leonard knew this. Jim was smart. He probably knew it, too.

He also probably knew that Leonard wasn't going to leave him to suffer it alone. At least, Leonard hoped he knew that.

The food processor's soup left a lot to be desired, and that was without taking into account the decline in its quality over the past month. Luckily, Leonard had a soft-spot for canned chicken soup when he was feeling under the weather or just out of sorts - usually around a holiday he wasn't able to spend with family. He quietly poured a can of chicken broth with bits of maybe-chicken into a pan and set it to heating on the stove while he made a call to the hospital.

"Doctor McCoy, shouldn't you be sleeping?"

"Ah'm fine," Leonard said, skipping the niceties. "Just checking in that there hasn't been any new developments."

There was a very disquieting silence on the other line, and then a soft, "We've heard no good news."

"Ah." He ran a hand through his hair, ending up scratching the back of his neck in discomfort. "That implies you've had bad news."

More silence.

"David," Leonard said, addressing the doctor, toning down his gruff snarl as best he could. "Tell me."

"Jackson got sick." Leonard closed his eyes at the words. "It hit him hard and fast."

"How long ago?" Leonard thought of the boy who had assisted him in so many operations. The doctor-in-training who had a scary amount of potential and more compassion besides. He was going to be a fantastic doctor, a better one than McCoy, and this damn sickness was _not_ going to stop that. He'd get better.

"Less than an hour. Forty minutes."

"What are his symptoms?" Leonard asked, thinking of Jim's shaking limbs, high fever, and quiet stare. The way his skin was turning a milky translucent. They had to start getting better.

"Leonard."

The quiet use of his name brought Leonard's attention crashing back to the communicator. There was a bleakness in the doctor's voice that had Leonard's stomach trying to devour itself. He made a wordless sound of question into the communicator.

"Jackson passed," David answered quietly, his voice an apology. "Ten minutes ago."

Leonard swallowed.

Half an hour. Thirty minutes. The sickness had killed him in thirty minutes.

"Thank you for telling me," Leonard said, suddenly wanting to end the call before anything else happened. Wanting to end it before David told him that Jackson had risen from the newly-dead and gone on a killing spree, or that his head had been severed from his body in an attempt to keep that from happening. Maybe a stake had been driven into his heart. No, wait, that was vampires.

"Keep me posted," Leonard said quickly, ignoring the other doctor's attempts to speak to him. "McCoy out."

He turned off the communications device, ignoring the fact that no one would be able to tell him anything if he didn't leave it on.

It hardly seemed to matter.

_Shit. Jackson._

Leonard sat down on the couch and fisted his hands in his hair, tugging hard on the strands. He needed a quiet moment to gather his thoughts, to settle his raging heart, but all he could think about was a mop of dark curls and a stammered greeting every morning, a respect that seemed to border on hero-worship, and a boy who stuck by his side despite his gruff demeanor and grumbled complaints. Jackson was a good kid! He _had been_ …

Half an hour.

It suddenly occurred to Leonard he had no idea how long Jim had been in his apartment, how long he'd been sick.

Thoughts of entering the room to find the kid had died while he was _on the fucking phone_ nearly kept him from entering the room, but Leonard steeled himself with a doctor's impassivity. The same stonewalling against emotions that let him push Jackson's death to the side. He would deal with it later. Maybe. For now, he had a patient to try and save.

* * *

Jim didn't even know what day it was. He had no idea how long he had been sick. He admitted to not feeling well earlier in the week, but he had taken off from classes and holed himself up in his dorm room with bottled water and canned food for two days and came out of it feeling a hundred percent better. Back to classes and back to normal, it was at least two days after that when he fell abruptly sick again, this time far worse than he had before.

He remembered being in his dorm room, and he remembered thinking that he probably shouldn't remain there, not with so much sickness spreading across the campus. He'd known he needed to get to a doctor, but he hadn't wanted to go to the hospital. Instead, he'd made his way to Leonard's building and hacked his way into his dorm room. How he had managed to hack the key system even feeling half as bad as he looked presently, Leonard didn't know. Nor was he sure he wanted to.

Jim had apparently made his way into the bathroom to throw up rather violently into the toilet, and then passed out on the floor. He had no idea how long he'd lain there unconscious, coming to only when he heard the door open, when Leonard had returned.

 _No way to tell how long you've been sick,_ Leonard thought. He'd tried scanning Jim, but like all of the hospital patients, the sickness that was burning through them didn't come up as anything recognizable. Their technology was baffled, their medicines were useless, and Leonard felt completely helpless in the face of this disease. Jackson was dead. Countless people were dead and dying and _undead_. Jim was sick and probably dying. His fever had ratcheted up to 107, nearing a critical 108, and the tremors in his limbs were only dulling out of sheer exhaustion.

"This s-sucks," Jim groaned from where he lay on the bed, shivering under a thin sheet covered in ice.

"I know," Leonard said, sitting on the floor and watching as the boy shivered. "Sorry. Got to get your fever down and it's this or an ice bath."

"Ice b-baths suck."

Leonard's lips twitched into a grin. "Yeah. They do."

The lights in the room had been dimmed so Jim's sensitive eyes weren't bothered, but Leonard was still able to see. He had a pile of blankets at the end of the bed ready to throw over Jim once the kid's fever went down and he could remove the ice. It was an old method, but Leonard didn't like to discount those old methods. Besides, nothing they'd used at the hospital had seemed to help. He'd try this. The worst he could do was fail.

A half-eaten bowl of chicken soup was sitting on the table next to his bed, as well as an empty plate that had held buttered toast Leonard had selected from the food processor - the perfect food for a sick young man. That Jim had managed to eat anything was cause for celebration, in Leonard's opinion, though he had been hoping to get the whole bowl into him. He hoped he might be able to convince him to eat the rest later. Speaking of which…

"I'm going to go put this away," he said, standing up and grabbing the bowl. "When I come back, I'll check your temperature again."

Jim gave him a look that was quite possibly supposed to be a glare, but the shivering took too much away from it. Sighing in sympathy, Leonard grabbed his tricorder and scanned the kid. 104.

"Your fever's dropping," he said with relief, lowering the tricorder and smiling at the kid. He raised the bowl. "Let me put this away. Then we'll get you warm."

Seeing the accepting expression on Jim's face, Leonard took the bowl out into the kitchen. He covered it and set it in the fridge, along with the soup that had remained on the stove. He was tempted to eat some of it himself, but he'd rather save it for the kid. He had his doubts he would be able to keep anything else down.

A strangled scream from the bedroom tore him away from the kitchen and Leonard raced through the doorway. The pile of blankets had been tossed to the floor, along with half of the ice. The rest was shifting across the thin sheet that separated it from Jim's body as the boy contorted himself into painful positions. His head was tilted back and his mouth open, but his eyes had rolled up and Leonard could see the bare edge of his expanded pupils against his upper eyelids. Jim's fingers were twisted into rigid claws, his arms raised up as though reaching for something, his whole body shaking violently.

Swearing, Leonard grabbed the sheet and ripped it off of Jim's body, sending ice pelting across the bedroom. The top of the pajama outfit had twisted around his convulsing body and the buttons were straining not to snap under the pressure put upon them. Grabbing his tricorder, Leonard scanned Jim quickly, and then he grabbed a flailing wrist to check his pulse by hand.

The tormented beating of Jim's erratic heart terrified Leonard, because he had been getting better a moment ago. He had been getting better! And then, suddenly, a seizure, and it occurred to Leonard once again that _he had no idea how long Jim had been sick_. Jackson had died in half an hour. Half an hour! How long had it been for Jim?

There came another cry from Jim, a whimpered half-shrieking sound, and Leonard fumbled wildly to remember if Jim was allergic to anything in the soup that he had given him. But no, nothing in his file said he was allergic to any of the ingredients, but this fit was so remniscient of the third time Leonard had encountered the kid, when he'd had an allergic reaction to Benzocaine, that Leonard couldn't help but think…

_What about the toast? Is he allergic to toast? Or butter? I can't…_

He couldn't get his thoughts in order, couldn't seem to make his mind function. He knew he was flagging, had known it for hours, days, but he'd thought he could put off sleep for a little longer, get Jim better.

_But there's no getting better from this, is there? So many are dead. Jackson is dead. How can you possibly… there's nothing… allergic reaction._

His mind grasping onto the memory of that previous day, Leonard bolted into the bathroom and grabbed the medical bag he always kept stocked with supplies. The hypospray of epinephrine and the bottle of Benadryl were in their proper places and he grabbed them and rushed back into the room. He remembered the feel of Jim's irregular, pounding heart and he hoped it was just an allergic reaction. He really, really hoped the kid wasn't going into cardiac arrest. Leonard had seen enough people die in the last few days from this illness. He wasn't sure he could handle it if Jim…

It was wrong that Jim wasn't complaining about the hypospray. Wrong that he didn't protest vehemently against the taste of the Benadryl as Leonard coaxed it down his throat. Wrong that the tremors lingered even after the convulsions stopped, his muscles relaxing some of the way.

Sighing, Leonard ran a hand down his face and pulled it away, surprised. He hadn't realized he'd been crying.

He looked at Jim, at the twisted pajama top soaked with sweat, the bedsheets likewise, and scratched a hand through his hair. Right. Priorities.

Leonard scanned Jim with his tricorder, then went to fetch a new pair of pajamas and fresh bed sheets. He'd clean the kid up a bit and get him changed into something less sweaty. Then he'd set up his tricorder to keep up a continuous scan and try to get an hour of sleep, at least. If he didn't stop for a least a moment, he was going to drop.

Jim first, though. Then he could rest.

* * *

It took half an hour to get the bed sheets changed, Jim cleaned up and changed into a fresh pair of pajamas. A half an hour in which Jim's breathing and heartbeat seemed to ease, and in which he didn't die. Leonard was grateful, but confused. Jackson had died in half an hour. How long had Jim been sick? What was the difference? What made Jim so much stronger? What made Jackson so weak?

What had caused that seizure?

In the end, Leonard gave the mysteries up in favor of collapsing into the chair he'd set at the side of the bed. He was barely sitting down before consciousness fled from him. It wasn't a quiet, restful sleep. Even unconscious, Leonard's mind searched for an answer, and the scattered pieces of a lethal jigsaw puzzle made their way to him in dreams.

_Leonard blinked open his eyes, startled to find himself lying on a biobed. He sat up quickly, only to have hands pressing against his shoulders, forcing him back down. He saw radioactive blue eyes gleaming at him in concern and lay back more out of shock than anything._

" _Jim?"_

" _It's all right, Bones. You're gonna be okay."_

_He noted the stethoscope hanging from around Jim's neck and frowned. "What in the… are you wearing scrubs?"_

_Jim glanced down at his outfit, as though just as surprised as Leonard to find himself so dressed. "Well, this is weird." He met Leonard's eyes again, grinning. "You trying to tell me something, Bones?"_

" _What? How would that be telling you something? I didn't dress you!"_

"' _course you did," Jim said, and the grin was smaller this time, softer. "You're dreaming, Bones."_

" _Dreaming?"_

" _Yep! You're all passed out unconscious next to my bedside. Well, your bed, my side, but you're asleep. You about drove yourself into the ground." The smile gave way to a frown. "You shouldn't do that, Bones. You need to look out for yourself better. Stop worrying so much about me."_

" _Someone's got to," Leonard grumbled._

_That soft smile returned to the kid's face and he ducked his head. "Yeah, well. I'm glad it's you, anyway. Better than Redne. Next thing you know, he'll be taking up necrophilia." He grimaced abruptly. "Actually, that was mean. Nevermind." He ran his head through his hair, sending it every which way in a wild mess. "Right. Well, you can't stay here. Lots to figure out." He pulled a hypospray from the pocket of his scrubs._

" _Wait a minute! What do you mean?"_

" _Like I said, Bones, you're dreaming," Jim said, checking over the hypospray like he actually knew what he was doing. The thought of Doctor James T. Kirk terrified Leonard to the point of near-wakefulness and the image before him flickered wildly._

" _Wait wait wait!" Jim cried, grabbing hold of him. The image returned and he was given a perfect view of Jim's terrified expression, blue eyes wide. "Don't wake up yet. You can't."_

" _Why_ the fuck _not!" Leonard snarled._

" _Bones." Jim's hands tightened on his shoulders, trying to impart the seriousness of this._

_Leonard found himself listening without wanting to, unable to look away from Jim's face._

" _Look, I'm not really here, okay? I'm not really Jim."_

" _Right. You're my conscience. It takes the form of my most impulsive, idiotic patient, rather than someone with a full head of functioning brain cells."_

" _Shouldn't talk about yourself like that." Jim grinned that megawatt smile that so pissed Leonard off, mostly because he knew that was the intention of the smile. "But you're not half wrong. I wouldn't say I'm your conscience. I really hope your conscience has a better survival instinct than Jim Kirk." His face grew serious. "I am a part of you, though. I suppose you could say the impulsive part - the instinctive part of your mind that you ignore half of the time to follow rules and logic and all those great booksmarts you doctor-types are famous for."_

" _For not being Jim Kirk, you sound an awful lot like him."_

" _I suppose that's what happens when you're friends with someone long enough," not-Jim said. He released Leonard, stepping back and fiddling with the hypospray again. "Look. I don't have time to explain everything. You're asleep and there's a lot you need to work through before you wake up, so we can't go through everything or it'll never get fixed."_

" _What won't get fixed?" Leonard asked, beyond confused._

" _The sickness. This epidemic. You already know what's causing it, you just haven't put it together yet. That's why you're here. You have to put it together. You're so close. That's why I'm here - to give you a little push." He stepped forward, hypospray in hand._

" _What's that for?" Leonard asked, leaning away from the unknown chemical in the spray._

_Not-Jim-Kirk grinned that manic grin he was so famous for. "Payback," he said, and stabbed the hypospray into Leonard's neck with glee._

* * *

" _Ugh, this is vile."_

_Leonard blinked open his eyes and looked across the table to see one of the medical students staring into his bowl with unrestrained disgust._

" _What's wrong with it?" he heard himself ask. Wait, this had happened almost a month ago. He remembered the conversation. He'd been between classes and had taken time to go to the mess to grab lunch, knowing he wouldn't have time between class and his shift at the clinic to eat anything. He'd opted for a piece of fruit instead of grabbing something synthesized from the food processor. Fetch, one of his classmates, had gone for the soup. That was when it was discovered that their manufacturer had changed, and with it, the quality._

" _It's tastes like something died in it."_

" _That'd be the meat," Leonard had said, grinning at Fetch's expense._

" _This is vegetarian soup."_

_Leonard made a show of leaning over the soup bowl to study the contents. He cocked an eyebrow at the kid, then sat back down and took a showy bite of his peach, savoring it maybe a little too much._

" _You're an asshole, McCoy," Fetch said, getting up and dumping his soup in the trash. "Where'd the fruit come from?"_

" _Earth," McCoy said, grinning. "Which is a nice change."_

* * *

" _Christ in a bucket!" Redne yelled, as they watched another body get wheeled out of the hospital. "What the fuck is going on?"_

_Leonard shook his head. Another of their patients had died. Just one more to add to the list. When was it going to stop?_

_Jackson came rushing into the room and the part of Leonard that was lucid inside of the dream felt the pain of loss keenly. "Doctors, they've just brought in another group. Five of them." He'd met Leonard's eyes with his own terrified gaze. "They're all from our 505 class."_

_Leonard remembered this, too. Remembered what happened after it, too, when he followed Jackson out to find five of his classmates choking on their own vomit or seizing. Remembered trying to bring Fetch's fever down, their teasing back and forth about next time doing lunch somewhere that served decent food. Remembered covering the boy with another blanket after he'd been unable to bring him back. Remembered them wheeling him away. Another one gone. Just one more to add to the list._

* * *

" _Make sure you get some sleep, Jackson," Leonard said, locking his office door and turning to the kid. "You've been up as long as me."_ Longer _, Leonard thought._

" _I will," Jackson said, smiling that smile that had been coming easier lately - less frightened in the face of Leonard's grouching. "I'm meeting my brother for a late supper. Then I'll get some sleep."_

_The two started walking to the door, side-by-side. "Going anywhere special for a reunion?"_

_Jackson chuckled. "Not so much a reunion. He's in Starfleet, too. Engineering. Not quite sure how that happened, but it's nice to have family so close. It's just the mess for us, though." He grimaced. "I'm so sick of synthesizers."_

_Leonard grinned. "Just wait 'til you're on a starship. Nothing but processed food for_ years _."_

_He laughed as the intern groaned loudly._

* * *

" _What in the world are you eating?" Leonard asked, standing in the doorway to the nurses' office. Nurse O'Shal was the only one in there, sitting at the table holding a metal tube out of which she was pulling what looked like rat tails._

" _Ves'ka," she said, the sound of her native language so unfamiliar it had Leonard blinking in surprise. She was rarely so open with her coworkers. "It is from my home planet. My daughter sends me a care package every month." She cocked her head in the Bengalian rendition of a shrug, looking down in embarrassment. "I do not like your processed foods, so it is nice."_

_Leonard felt a smile curl across his face. "It's always nice to get something from home."_

* * *

_Leonard was standing in the kitchen of his dorm, stirring a pot of soup on the stove. He was eyeing the various kitchen appliances, thinking. Jim was actually starting to look better, even if his fever was still too high. The soup would help, he was sure, but maybe he could get something else into him, something with a little more substance._

_Toast was always good on an upset stomach. If he was lucky, Jim would be able to keep it down, and there was an option on his synthesizer for hot toast. Leonard thought he had some butter in the fridge…_

Leonard snapped awake with a yell, toppling from the chair and landing hard on his knees. They cracked loudly under the pressure but he ignored the pain, scrambling to his feet and racing out of the room. He heard Jim call out behind him, slurred questions about what was going on, but he sounded fine. Sleepy and sick, but fine, and he would get better, because suddenly, Leonard knew _exactly_ where the illness was coming from. He'd known for _weeks_.

He slammed his hand around the communicator, swearing when nothing happened and spending precious minutes trying to figure out what was wrong, before finally turning the communicator back on. He immediately punched in the code he had for Captain Pike, having installed it on his main contacts after he had received a visit from the captain, right after Jim's anaphalactic seizure in the hospital. He knew, of everyone at the campus, Pike would take a moment and listen to what Leonard had to say, ignoring the fact that he was just a student, just a doctor. Pike would listen, and then _he_ could contact the proper people.

"This is Christopher Pike," came the captain's voice on the comm., and Leonard _knew_ the captain would know who was calling him and he was immensely grateful again for the man's unbiased treatment of everyone at the academy.

"Captain Pike, this is Doctor McCoy."

"Good morning, Doctor McCoy," Pike greeted, and Leonard had the briefest moment in which to note _morning?_ and wonder how many of the doctors had tried to call him when he didn't turn up back at the hospital in time, before Pike's strained voice continued, "Is there something I can do for you?"

"I know where the sickness is coming from, sir," Leonard said, his voice coming out in a rush. "It's the food processors. The synthesizers. Everyone who's been sick has been using them. The more use, the sicker they've gotten, especially those not used to using them. Who haven't built up a tolerance to… to whatever's in them. Take away the processors and people start to get better, but it only takes a little bit of processed foods to make them sick again. Like toast. Toast is enough to make them sick, but the soup is the worst, I think, sir. Doesn't taste right. Not since they changed the manufacturer. Tastes wrong. Like something died in it."

He stopped his rambling finally, realizing that he must sound half-mad - feeling a little half-mad - and wondering if he had just ruined his chances at Pike listening to him.

"Have you looked into the foods produced?"

"Not beyond obvious bodily reactions, sir. I haven't had time. I only just realized…" Maybe he shouldn't have said that. Maybe he shouldn't have admitted it was just a connection, that he just figured it out. Maybe Pike would think it was all in his head. _Is it all in my head?_

"Is Kirk with you?" Pike asked, surprising Leonard.

He stumbled for a moment on his words, and then, "Yes, sir. Sleeping, I think. Or he was."

"Is he sick?" Was that concern Leonard heard in Pike's voice? Not just the basic concern of a teacher for his student, but something deeper. The concern of a father…

"He is, sir, but he seems to be getting better. His fever was coming down, but then I gave him some toast. He reacted badly. He's not allergic to toast, is he?"

Leonard barely restrained a groan. He ran a hand through his hair. Why was the filter between his brain and mouth malfunctioning _now_?

"Doctor McCoy," Pike said seriously, "are you _sure_ it's the food synthesizers causing this issue?" Leonard could hear voices in the background raise at Pike's words and he wondered where the captain had been when he called.

"I'm sure, sir," he said without hesitating. And just because he didn't know if that would be enough, he added, "I'd stake my job on it."

"That won't be necessary," Pike said. His voice softened as he asked, "Are you at your dorm, McCoy?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. I want you to stay there."

Leonard felt a protest rise up stubbornly. "I'm late for my shift at the hospital."

"The hospital has been quarantined. No one in, no on out. The campus and surrounding cities are on lockdown." The voice softened to an almost whisper. "How's Jim?"

"Fine, sir."

Leonard jumped, spinning around to find Jim standing behind him. He still looked like shit, dark bags under his eyes, cracked lips, and glassy eyes, but his skin had more color than it'd had before and he didn't have that wide stare he'd been sporting. And he wasn't having a seizure, which was a serious plus. Not even any tremors.

Instinctively, Leonard reached up and felt the kid's forehead. "Your fever is down," he murmured.

Jim was watching him with a quiet intensity that probably would have made Leonard feel uncomfortable if he wasn't too tired to think straight.

"Bones is taking good care of me, sir. Another couple of days and I'll be back in action." Jim spoke firmly to Pike, but his eyes never left Leonard's face. "And I think his idea is a good one, sir. The synthesizers. They haven't been right for about a month."

"You'll take a few more days than two, Jim, but I'm glad you're feeling better," Pike replied, and the background noise had faded. Either the other people had left or Pike had moved to a more private location. "Both of you stay in the dorm. Don't leave not matter what, and don't use your food processor. I'm going to be talking to the science division, having them run some tests. Doctor McCoy."

"Yes, sir?"

"Since Cadet Kirk is doing so much better, I expect you to look after yourself. Get some sleep. As soon as I know what's actually causing this illness, I'll be contacting you. When we have a cure, I'll want you administering it. I have it on high authority you're the best doctor in Starfleet."

Leonard swallowed, flicking a glance at Jim, whose gaze was focused resolutely on the communicator.

"Cadet Kirk."

"Yes, sir?"

"I want you to take care of the doctor."

Jim gave the communicator a serious look, as though it might transfer through the audio over to where Pike could see it. "Yes, Captain," he said. And considering the tone of his voice, Leonard wasn't so sure it _wouldn't_ transfer.

"Very well. Pike out."

The communicator went silent and for a long moment, the two of them stayed quiet, staring at the device in Leonard's hand. Then, Jim let out a long breath, rolled his shoulders, and lifted his head to regard Leonard with a disturbingly unreadable look.

"Right, Bones. Time for all good doctors to go to bed."

Leonard cocked an eyebrow at Jim in disbelief. "Says the kid who was having a seizure not an hour ago?"

Jim grinned that devil-may-care grin and nodded his head at the clock on the wall. "Try six hours, Bonesy." He grabbed the doctor's arm as Leonard stared, baffled, at the clock. "Come on. You get to bed and I'll make us some food. _Actual_ food."

Leonard found he could barely protest. The adrenaline rush that had spiked during his waking from the dream was receding, leaving him feeling more tired than he had before he'd fallen asleep in the chair. He let Jim lead to him to the couch, where he sank down into the cushions and immediately started drifting to sleep. He was barely conscious of the blanket being spread over him. He almost didn't feel the hand that rested, just for a moment, on his shoulder, as though the owner was trying to communicate something he could not find words for. In fact, the last thing that Leonard McCoy _was_ aware of was the sound of a food processor being smashed to teeny-tiny bits with a soup pan. The sound itself was pleasantly cathartic, and Leonard finally slipped off to sleep to the sound of a destructive lullaby.


End file.
